photo by Howard Fischer
''According to Goldman''
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A black and white film is showing when the lights come up on Alliance Repertory’s production of Bruce Graham’s “According to Goldman.” Gavin Miller (Kevin Gilmartin) looks like a kindly next-door-neighbor type from Central Casting. At present, he’s a college instructor teaching film writing to a group of greenhorns. When he begins with the statement, “I can teach you how to write a good script, or one that will sell,” you know to fasten your seatbelts … the ride will indeed be bumpy.

Gavin’s wife Melanie (Angela Della Ventura) does her best to get her crun-chewy luftmensch to commit to their home. She’s the local welcome wagon and a motherly type, though she and Gavin don’t have children. She’s hopeful they will finally put down roots somewhere that won’t poison her husband’s soul.

Much earlier in his career, Gavin was a successful screenwriter. When he culls through the initial surveys that will give him an idea of how to approach the students and what they’ll need, he shows his know-it-all cynicism. But beneath that crunch, there’s something he’s protecting.

Immediately after the first class of the semester, a young shy man asks to add Gavin’s class. While it would be a breach of one of his cardinal rules, Jeremiah (Jason Gillis) sufficiently impresses Gavin to get him to bend that rule. Neither knows that he is setting a precedent for their future relationship.

David Christopher’s direction teases out a passion play of sorts from this motley group of people, so normal on the surface. Communication, however, is what is done by the listener and listening occurs only occasionally with this dramatis personae, until the point where the rubber hits the road.

Gilmartin has the cynical surface and the soft center that he’s protecting, but there’s something more tender than that–his battered ego. As much as he knows, there is a secret that he’s not even shared with his wife. Della Ventura turns the screw as the devoted Melanie. She’s finding herself just as Gav is losing his way, but her moral compass never waivers. Gillis as the young, tortured writer is by turns innocent, socially maladroit, and as incisive as a crocodile, who knows when to apply the pressure and when the tears will work.

What does “According to Goldman” mean? Everything in the play has layers and this seemingly unrelated title has so much meaning. The characters are as tightly strung as violins and the violence they cause one another is deep, emotional, and leaves no external mark. You’ll have a great deal to consider on your way out the door, calling your friends to encourage them to see it too. Film? TV? plays?—they’re all about people, and what people these are!

Alliance Repertory presents “According to Goldman” in New Jersey at Union County PAC’s Studio Theatre through March 26. Visit www.AllianceRep.org for tickets and additional information.